Comments on: Cultural Differences Provide New Opportunities http://balbes.com/wordpress/?p=420 Take charge of your own professional destiny Sun, 01 Aug 2010 06:38:30 -0400 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 By: John Fetzer http://balbes.com/wordpress/?p=420&cpage=1#comment-46701 John Fetzer Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:25:38 +0000 http://balbes.com/wordpress/?p=420#comment-46701 The person attempting this must always remember that the role is to be a bridge and conduit. Having worked with East Asian, South Asian, and Middle Eastern people, these can be keys to acceptance and creating a good working relationship. Areas like status and role are much more important in those cultures than in those of the US or western Europe. That means not only providing awareness of your culture to another. One key need is to do the homework of learning the culture that you are bridging to. What are its customs, its taboos, its norms in interactions, its expected behaviors? If you do not do these, you are not preparing yourself to deliver your message to your audience. You want to be seen as knowledgable, authoratative, yet friendly and approachable. Interactions that welcome questions and clarifying are needed. The person attempting this must always remember that the role is to be a bridge and conduit. Having worked with East Asian, South Asian, and Middle Eastern people, these can be keys to acceptance and creating a good working relationship. Areas like status and role are much more important in those cultures than in those of the US or western Europe.

That means not only providing awareness of your culture to another. One key need is to do the homework of learning the culture that you are bridging to. What are its customs, its taboos, its norms in interactions, its expected behaviors?

If you do not do these, you are not preparing yourself to deliver your message to your audience. You want to be seen as knowledgable, authoratative, yet friendly and approachable. Interactions that welcome questions and clarifying are needed.

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